


Earl Grey

by howardently



Category: My Mad Fat Diary
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-06-17
Updated: 2015-06-16
Packaged: 2018-04-04 19:12:39
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 2
Words: 12,230
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/4149600
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/howardently/pseuds/howardently
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>AU. Rae's got a YouTube show talking about the ways music intersects with her life, and someone's discovered a major video.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Chapter 1

The message is weird. Especially coming from Chop. Chop never sent emails, and if by some off chance he did, Finn never would have expected it to read so… normal.

Finn, thought you might want to check this out…

He wonders if it’s maybe spam, if Chop’s account got hacked or something. He knows you’re not supposed to click links sent in strange sounding emails, but… he’s not certain it’s not Chop, and it’s just a link to a youtube clip. Youtube never hurt anyone. It’s probably just porn or something, he reasons. Busty Babe Bounces on Trampoline- that’s definitely Chop’s style. So, he clicks.

It takes the page a long time to load, and Finn finds himself biting his cuticles as he waits, strangely anxious for whatever it is. It’s sure to be stupid nonsense, probably Chop discovered Vines and is dying to share some clip with him. But his heart’s beating a bit too hard and he’s not exactly sure why.

But then it loads, and he sees her face. He smiles automatically, despite his confusion. He can’t help it, it’s like a biological response to seeing her, a big stupid grin that he has to smother down. But he’s alone, and here she is right there in that little box on his screen- her big expressive eyes, her long shiny curtain of dark hair, her rosy cheeks and ineffable smile. A sudden flash of heat courses through him as he considers the wanking possibilities of tiny little Rae trapped right there in his laptop screen.

If Chop’s intention was to cheer him up, it’s working.

As he watches the little gray bar grow longer and longer, he wonders why she didn’t tell him she was making youtube videos. They’re friends now. After the party a couple of weeks ago, they finally overcame whatever weirdness was between them and they’re actually okay. He’s called her four times since then, and they’ve texted everyday. They talked on the phone for over an hour the other night, longer than he’s ever talked on the phone with anyone. She could have told him about whatever it was.

Once the bar has finally filled, he finds himself hesitating over the play button, his heart pounding stupidly once more. He’s not even sure why. He scans through his emotions, looks for the usual culprits: he’s not anxious, not scared, not angry. Why would his heart be pounding like this? He studies her frozen face for a moment, lets himself linger on her in the way he always wants to. Then he clicks the button and his lips curl up as she begins to talk.

“Hey everybody.” She says cheerfully, smiling and giving the camera a little wave. “Welcome to another episode of Earl Grey. I’m Rae, your host and resident musical genius, and I’m really excited to share another great tune with you.”

He grins down at the screen. Her natural vibrancy and charisma relays perfectly through the screen. She’s lovely. And if she’s going to have a youtube show, of course it’s going to be about music. Of course.

“You know, it’s funny. When I started this thing a few months ago, it was with the idea that no one would watch it. It’s hard for me to believe how many people have subscribed, how many of you would say such positive and encouraging things.” Rae wrinkles her nose through a grin, her whole face lit up. She’s so cute he can hardly focus. He tells himself that he’s not going to pause, he’s going to watch all the way through this first time and then he can go back and linger over the adorable faces she makes. He can watch it as many times as he wants, and no one will ever know. Thank fuck for the internet. “This started as a kind of therapy, and now it’s a community of friends. I’m really grateful to have all you guys, and I’m glad that you’re interested in the music… and well, my life, really!”

A pleasant warmth diffuses through his body as he watches her laugh softly and duck her head. He recognizes her room behind her, flushes to think of the time he’d recently spent in that bed pretending to sleep while listening to her breathe. His fingers begin the familiar itch to touch her, and he indulges himself by trailing a finger across the screen, following the path of her cheek. When she raises her eyes to the screen, she’s wearing this big, soft kind of smile that makes his something flutter in his chest.

“So, normally I do the song and then talk about what it means to me and how it relates to my life, you know the drill.” It occurs to him suddenly that this is not her first video, and when he checks the scans the screen for the episode number – 13!- he has to stop himself from springing out of his chair to jump around the room in exaltation. Thirteen episodes of Rae’s laughter and smiles and musical selections. It’s the best thing to happen to him in a long time. He makes himself reign it in, she’s talking again and he doesn’t want to miss a single word.

“But today, I’m gonna mix it up a little because something kind of big happened this weekend and I’m really excited to share it with you guys.” Rae bites her lip and closes her eyes for a second, nose crinkling just a little, and it’s such a perfect, irrepressibly happy expression that he pauses and makes the video full screen. She looks… romantic, almost. Swoony. It’s not an expression he’s ever seen on her before, and he finds himself filled with longing. He wants that expression for himself, wants her to make that face over him. He stares at her sadly for a long moment, then shakes himself and presses play again.

“Okay, so I had this party at my house over the weekend, a spur of the moment sort of thing.” She grins mischievously at the camera, raises her eyebrows. “My Mum was gone and I decided that I really wanted to piss her off, so I let my mate throw a ‘sexy party’ at mine.”

She does the air quotes, and shakes her head. Finn laughs, thinking about how Chop had inadvertently titled the party, even though nothing that comes close to being sexy even happened.

“It’s stupid really, nothing sexy even happened, but I’ll probably always think of it as the sexy party.” Rae laughs, and then leans in a bit closer to the camera like she’s about to tell a secret, a flush warming her cheeks. “Anyways, you know how I told you guys about the boy I secretly fancy? Well, he was there, and… something maybe kind of happened?”

Video Rae is pressing her lips together to fight off a grin, but Finn feels like he got kicked in the stomach. There seems to be less air in the room somehow, and a gnawing starts in the pit of his belly. Fuck. When did that happen? He’d been there for the whole fucking party, when did she have time for something to happen with this mystery guy? He pauses the video, pushes away from his desk and stomps across the room.

Who was it? That weird Danny kid? They used to go out, maybe they were starting back up again? Or Archie, maybe? They always seem so goddamn chummy together. Maybe they’ve finally worked their shit out. Or maybe it was someone else altogether, someone he’s not even thinking of. He did take off after they were in the cupboard together, even though she went back to spin the bottle. Maybe she hooked up with someone else while he was off sulking.

Finn grabs his phone and texts Chop before he even really thinks about it, his frustration getting the better of him. It’s been this way since Nan died, his temper is on a hair-trigger, and he’s doing all sorts of shit he wouldn’t normally do because he can’t seem to control himself very well at the moment.

WHO’D RAE HOOK UP WITH AT THE SEXY PARTY?

He drops back into his chair and stares at his phone in aggravation. Fucking Chop. He waits for the three little dots that mean his mate is replying, but then he remembers Chop works late on Thursdays and won’t answer his text until later. He spins around and looks at Rae frozen on the screen, her cheeks pink and her mouth open. If he squints just a little, it looks like she’s giving him a sexy, inviting pout. He wonders who has gotten to kiss those lips. He sighs and hits the space bar, leaning back in his chair like he can physically distance himself from the words she’s about to speak.

“It was… ugh. So this friend of mine gave me some really bad advice.” She rolls her eyes towards the ceiling. He grunts. Every word elicits a thousand more questions. “He said I should… like, create tension. To keep from getting stuck in the friendzone. He actually said, ‘Treat him mean to keep him keen,’ and as stupid as that is, I dunno, I just did it. I was kind of mean, to the one person I really didn’t want to be mean to.”

Rae ducks her head, looks at the camera through her eyelashes, like she’s too ashamed to look dead on. Finn’s breath is coming shallowly, this is all sounding very familiar. Hadn’t he accused her of being totally rude? He recalls her wide-eyed confused expression when he told her she was rude, compares it to the sad, rueful one Video Rae is wearing. She can’t mean him… can she?

“But he, he…” She pauses and smiles softly, lost in reverie for a moment. “He called me on it. We had this weird, terrible, quiet kind of row… He asked me if I was his friend, and I told him I didn’t want to be his friend. I mean, I don’t! I want to shag him bloody senseless, but his face… I think I really hurt him.”

Finn’s heart is pounding in his ears, almost too loud for him to hear what she’s saying. He feels strange, weightless, like he might suddenly lift right up out of himself and float away. The conversation in the closet comes back to him like a fog that descends suddenly and obscures everything from view.

“It is as simple as that, Rae. Either we’re friends or we’re not friends.“

“Maybe I don’t want to be your friend.”

“You what?”

“Maybe I don’t want to be your friend.”

He’s such a bloody idiot. He’d thought she hadn’t wanted anything to do with him, that she couldn’t stand him, didn’t want to even be around him. But she’d been saying that she wanted to be something more. For fucks sake, she’s talking about him. He’s the guy she secretly fancies.

The smile that overtakes his face is slow but brilliant. Rae secretly fancies him.

The video is still playing, and he quickly scrubs back to where he left off, keen to hear every single word. He doesn’t want to miss a single blink, a single breath, a single syllable. She fancies him.

“I think I really hurt him.” Rae repeats forlornly, pouting just a little bit. “And then… something bad happened, something that’s just… it was more important than our stuff, than me liking him and trying to get him to like me, and I…”

She struggles for words, looks down frowning and shaking her head. Finn aches, both for her and in remembrance of the pain that had seared through his nerve endings as he’d sat there in the midst of the party, holding the phone and processing the news. He’d wanted to come home right away, go do something, anything to help. But his Dad had convinced him to stay- Nan was in a better place, her pain was finally over, there was nothing he could do, he should honor her by being happy. It was all little relief, nowhere near enough to stave off the hurt of losing her. But Rae’s arms, they’d been exactly what he needed, and he’d felt, just for a second as Rae’s arms held him together, that Nan was there with them, winking at him to just get on with it.

“I think I was there for him when he needed me.” She says softly, and her eyes seem to be piercing the screen and holding intentionally on his. The corners of her mouth twitch briefly, and a small smile creeps over her features.

“And then, we…” Rae raises her eyes to the ceiling for a moment, her smile widening, and when she looks back, she’s luminous. “We slept together.”

She sighs, dreamy and lovely. Finn bites his lip, feeling pretty dreamy himself.

“Wait! No!” She shakes her hands in front of her, eyes wide and shocked. “I don’t mean… I mean we literally slept next to each other. Not like slept together, we… went to sleep together.”

She laughs, and it’s infectious enough that he finds himself chuckling on the other side of the monitor. He feels strange, outside of himself, ebullient in a way he’s never experienced before. His skin is almost itching with it. The world has shrunk to the blueish glow of his monitor, to the rectangular frame encasing Rae. Video Rae, Rae who fancies him.

On the screen, Rae’s laughing, nose wrinkled the same way it had the night of the party. “I mean, I wish we’d slept together, right? But… it was enough to sleep together. It was… perfect. He said he liked talking to me. And he kissed my cheek when he left the next morning.”

She bites her lip and he thinks again about how she seems to glow, how her radiance bleeds out of her and warms him up. He’s seen it in person, experienced how just being near her made the world a little brighter. But he’s still surprised a little by how well it translates through the screen. She’s just as dynamic, maybe even a little more so.

“I know it’s not much, when it’s laid out like that,” she lowers her eyes, until her eyelashes rest dark and heavy against her cheeks. When she lifts them to the camera, to what he can’t help but imagine is to him, they’re bright and still unfathomable. “But it felt… it feels like a lot. Like something.”

His breath catches, because there in those words, he can feel exactly how she feels. Her soft steady voice, slightly tinny through the laptop speakers, translates perfectly and he experiences the same tentative hope, the same thready wonder. And it’s hers, her hope, her wonder. Even though he’s had many of the same emotions over the last couple of weeks, right now it’s hers that he can feel. They have a different cadence, a rhythm that’s distinct from his own. It’s almost supernatural, almost magic the way it feels. He swallows heavily, eyes incapable of looking away.

“So, that’s where today’s song comes from.” She says with a deep breath, and the spell is broken. He rolls his shoulders, suddenly aware once again that he has shoulders, and that they’ve been hunched over in an unconscious effort to somehow break through the screen and get to her. “This is one of those inscrutable songs that really means completely different things to different people, but for me, it’s always been about that first hint of something more, that agony of hope.”

She gives a minuscule nod, closes her eyes and touches her lips for just a second. It’s another romantic sort of gesture, and this time his heart soars. Something about that little movement, the moment she takes to collect herself, to shake herself from her dreamy musings- it goes much farther than her words to making him believe in the reality of all of this. He suddenly gets that this is not a video made for him, there are no affectations here, no put-ons. She’s not doing this because she wants to make him like her, she just fancies him and thinks about him when she listens to music.

Video Rae reaches off screen and pulls into frame the battered guitar that lives in a corner of her room. She looks down as she places her fingers and strums softly, testing the sound. She adjusts it briefly and looks back towards the camera, and he realizes, she’s going to sing. He rubs his hands over his jeans, rests them on his knees and takes a deep, steadying breath. Three bars in, he recognizes the song, and his eyebrows lower as he studies her face, watches her mouth move.

Every time I think of you,  
I feel shot right through with a bolt of blue.  
It’s no problem of mine,  
But it’s a problem I find,  
Living a life that I can’t leave behind.

But there’s no sense in telling me  
The wisdom of the fool won’t set you free.  
But that’s the way that it goes,  
And it’s what nobody knows,  
Well every day my confusion grows,

Every time I see you falling,  
I get down on my knees and pray.  
I’m waiting for that final moment  
You say the words that I can’t say.

Finn’s stunned. His head reels, and he stares unblinkingly at the screen as her lovely voice emerges from the speakers. He had no idea she could sing, none at all. It shouldn’t be surprising, since she is so into music, but… it is. Her voice is gorgeous. She’s changed the tempo of the song a bit, made it slower and slinkier, and her voice winds through the air around him and grips him in a vice.

He feels like he may never be able to draw a real breath again.

I feel fine and I feel good,  
I’m feeling like I never should.  
Whenever I get this way,  
I just don’t know what to say.  
Why can’t we be ourselves like we were yesterday?

I’m not sure what this could mean,  
I don’t think you’re what you seem.  
I do admit to myself  
That if I hurt someone else,  
Then I’ll never see just what we’re meant to be.

Every time I see you falling,  
I get down on my knees and pray.  
I’m waiting for that final moment  
You say the words that I can’t say.

Every time I see you falling,  
I get down on my knees and pray.  
I’m waiting for that final moment,  
You say the words that I can’t say.

She’s mostly kept her head down as she sings, bobbing in tune with the music and avoiding looking at the camera. He doesn’t realize how much of a difference it makes until she raises her gaze and holds steady contact with the camera as she sings the last chorus. It feels as if she’s singing straight to him, as if this melody, these words are a message across the unknowable distance between them.

Every time I see you falling,  
I get down on my knees and pray.  
I’m waiting for that final moment,  
You say the words that I can’t say.

She lowers her gaze as her voice fades out, watches her fingers as they strum the last of the song. His chest throbs in the silence that takes over the room as she sets the guitar down and adjusts herself in her chair. It’s as if his body has suddenly forgotten how to do all the things it normally does without any thought or effort. He’s aware of the thrumming of his heart beneath his ribs, of the labored pulsing of his blood within his veins. His lungs no longer seem to work properly, he can hear the breath entering them and leaving again, but the oxygen doesn’t seem to be making it to his brain. Even blinking is an effort, he has to force his burning eyes to close over and over, as they seem to spring open of their own accord. And for that few short moments, those interminably long seconds stretching for forever, he can feel something growing inside of him that he doesn’t have a name for just yet.

Video Rae smiles back at the camera, gives a self-conscious kind of shrug. She twists her lips around for a second and then huffs a soft chuckle.

“I know all the lyrics don’t exactly fit, but most of them are painfully true. I do feel blue when I think about him, and I do have trouble leaving… stuff… in the past. And, Danny’s ‘wisdom’ certainly didn’t do much for me.” She rolls her eyes and shakes her head, but a fond smile graces her lips as she looks down briefly. “And probably a lot of it is just wishful thinking. Most of it. It’s confusing, he acts like he might be interested in more… he writes on my legs with his finger, did I tell you that?”

Rae laughs, and Finn blushes. Maybe his sneaky plan about their secret language isn’t so sneaky after all.

“And sometimes he looks at me like…” She raises a shoulder and inhales deeply, but shakes her head with the inability to find the right word. “It’s good. ‘I feel fine and I feel good,’ but I can’t shake the fact that ‘I’m feeling like I never should.’ I’m almost positive that it’s all in my head, that it’s mostly delusions and fantasy brought on by one too many romance novels. It’s confusing and sometimes I wish it were simpler, that we ‘could be ourselves like we were yesterday.’”

Her eyes are sad now, sad in a way that he thinks is beyond thinking he doesn’t like her. She’s mysterious, layers upon layers, and he wants to peel her down and see who she really is at her core. Does she really want to go back to how they were before? He’d give a lot to go back to the time before the sexy party, to go back and steal one more day with Nan before she was gone. But this thing with Rae, it’s the best part of all of this, the one good thing to come out of Nan dying. And he wouldn’t want to go back to before that at all.

“But then, just when I’ve convinced myself it’s all in my head, he’ll say something, or give me a look or a smile, and I think, ‘it’s not just me, he’s falling too.’” She smiles again, but it slips into a pursed frown in only a second. She’s silent for a bit, and when she speaks again, her brows are low over glassy eyes. “So, here I am praying that he’ll say the words that I can’t say. I know he won’t, I know he doesn’t see me like that, buy hey, what are video blogs for except moping about your lack of love life?”

Rae laughs and it’s brighter this time. He marvels at her ability to shift emotions with the drop of the hat like that, he’s always been one to get stuck in one thing for a ridiculous amount of time. She throws her hands up in the air, cocks her head and smiles.

“Well that’s it for today everybody. Thanks for watching. As always, there’s a link below to the original version of this outstanding tune. If you like what you saw, or if you’re interested in the continuing riveting story of my imagined romance with Finn, please subscribe and share with your friends. This was Earl Grey. See you next week.” Video Rae gives a cheery wave to the screen before the little box freezes and goes black.

Finn leans back in his chair, dangerously far, and tries to wrap his head around what he just saw. And then it hits him: she’d said his name. There’s no mistaking, this was about him, this song is about him. The thought is big, and sobering. Music is a language he understands, he knows perfectly well how the right song can say something much better than you ever can. His Knebworth mixtape flares into his mind, how carefully he’d chosen all those songs, with her in mind. He’d painstakingly crafted mood and tone and meaning through melody. And now here she was, doing the same.

Only, hers is somehow more genuine because it’s not meant for him. She said she started these videos as a form of therapy. She’s only making them to express herself, not to accomplish anything. The Knebworth mix had a very specific purpose.

This song… these were the words she wishes she could say.

He holds still and focuses on his breathing for several long minutes, steadies himself with the rhythmic whooshing of air in and out of his lungs. Rae Earl, his Rae, the Rae he’s fancied for the last month wants him too. That’s all he really needs to know, isn’t it?

His chair spins absently as he shoots out of it and fumbles to put his boots on. Rae’s face is frozen on the screen in a crooked smile, the next video having queued up while he pondered, but it clicks over into a series of blue swirls as his screen saver comes on. He pulls a flannel over one shoulder, forgetting the other arm in his rush to get out the door, but he does take a minute to glance at himself in the mirror and adjust his fringe until it’s lying flat. Then he’s down the stairs and out the door, the house falling silent and still behind him.

He doesn’t worry about finding the words that she can’t say. He doesn’t worry about words at all. He’s got another way to get the message across that doesn’t require any words whatsoever.

In the stillness of his room, his forgotten phone vibrates on his desk, a picture of Chop’s wide grin displayed over a single line of text.

IT’S ONLY YOU, MATE. GO GET HER.


	2. Chapter 2

It’s been two days. Two long, agonizing days since he’d sent it to her. And he hasn’t heard a word.

Worse, it’s been four and a half since he’s even seen her. She disappeared completely after it happened, and not just from him. She hasn’t been at the pub, hasn’t come round to the park, hasn’t returned anyone’s calls or texts. Well, she hasn’t returned his calls or texts. He supposes the girls would seem more worried if she wasn’t returning anyone’s calls. But still. It’s the longest he’s gone without talking to her since they met.

It feels like forever. He hadn’t been able to call her and enthuse about the new Decemberists album. He hadn’t been able to groan over the Brit awards. He hadn’t been able to hear her laugh about that dumb article on Beck in the new issue of Q. It’s been nothing. Four and a half days of nothing.

He’s positive that if he hadn’t already wanted her so badly, this disappearing act of hers would seal the deal. He’s completely miserable without her.

He can hardly stand being around anyone. He’d spent about twenty minutes with the gang this morning before he’d lost it and snapped Chop’s head off about some dumb comment he made. Even his Dad has taken to stepping carefully around him. So Finn’s kept mostly to himself, stalking uselessly around his room, listening to the Smiths and the Civil Wars on a loop. He creates a playlist so depressing that he’s disgusted with himself and can’t even listen to it.

It’s preposterous, really, that he should be so wretched without someone he didn’t even know two months ago. He spends a fitful night staring up at his ceiling, wondering if she’s some kind of sorceress to have so thoroughly ensnared him in such a short amount of time. He’s grumpy Finn Nelson, hesitant to like anyone, rarely letting people in. How’d Rae manage to circumvent his defenses so quickly? How’d she manage to alter him so much without him even realizing it?

He thinks he’d hate her if he didn’t already fancy her so damn much.

He’s lurking on her Facebook page, lingering over the few pictures of her that are on there. She never posts anything, and the pictures are clearly old, but there’s one where she’s smiling at someone to the right of the camera… he saves it to his laptop like the lovesick psycho stalker he is. She just looks so beautiful, loose somehow in a way that he rarely sees. She laughs all the time, but she rarely just smiles with that kind of breezy self-assurance, that kind of carefree happiness.

He debates opening Photoshop and pasting himself in, just to see how they’d look together. Like a proper couple. Her dark hair and pale skin set off by his warmer coloring. Then he realizes what a complete weirdo he’s being, and he opens his browser to find something to do on the internet to kill a few hollow hours. Reddit is usually a decent distraction.

When his email pops up, and he sees her name, his heart starts to pound. There’s no subject, just a series of dots, and he clicks it open before his mailbox has even finished loading.

It’s only one line. Just a single sentence and a link. He scans it quickly, eyes moving faster than his brain can keep up. Then he reads it again slower.

I’m so sorry. Of course I notice you.

He furrows his forehead, bites his fingernails as he ponders the sentence. He tabs over into iTunes and shuts the music off, then tabs back and clicks on the link. It goes through to her YouTube channel, and he bites his cuticles hard, wincing as pain shoots through his finger and the coppery taste of blood settles on his tongue. She’s posted a new video. He closes his eyes for a moment, forces himself to breathe through the anxiety that’s suddenly clouding his lungs. This is it, he knows, this is the verdict, the decision. He starts to tap his foot underneath the desk, and he clicks through to her channel for a second, just to check. The videos are all back up.

His skin nearly sparks with the desire to watch them all, to languish in Rae’s charm and lovely voice. And to prolong this last moment before he knows for sure whether there is any hope for them. He holds the cursor over the first video, smiles at the tiny little grin preview Rae is wearing in the small box. She’s so pretty even in miniature. He laughs at himself as he has a brief but intense longing to pluck her out and carry her around in his pocket, just so that he’d always have her to crack bad jokes and roll her eyes to lighten whatever situation he finds himself in. He imagines her boy band tirade from last week in a delicate squeaky mouse voice and it’s somehow enough to lessen the nervous energy coursing through him.

He really wants to watch the videos, wants to have that hour of Rae to keep for himself, but he knows he shouldn’t, that he needs to respect her privacy. He winces as he recalls their strange, tense little argument when he’d mentioned the videos, how low and hurt her voice got. The whole thing had been a disaster, really. He groans as the scene starts to replay in his head, gets up to throw himself facedown on the bed. There’s nothing he can do really; it’s replayed, in its excruciating entirety, in his head at least twice a day since it happened. He just has to bear it as best he can.

He’d been so excited to see her that he started walking automatically towards her house, and had to double back to get the scooter. He’d show up on his bike when he told her, naturally, wearing his leather jacket and looking smooth and cool. He couldn’t just walk up to her house and tell her he wanted her, he’d have to arrive.

But the roar of the wind had seriously curbed his ability to plan what he’d say, so he’d gone in without a speech on the ready- a definite bad move. He knows better, he always plans it out at least a bit. In fact, he spends kind of a gross amount of time rehearsing what he’s going to say to her. He practices their conversations in his head, revising them over and over until he comes up with the version that makes him sound smart and dashing. But the new information about her feelings for him had derailed all his ready-to-go speeches, the ones he’d prepared to tell her how he felt in case the opportunity presented itself. So, he’d gone in blind, and really it’s no surprise that he botched it.

He’d sat outside her house for a couple of minutes, trying to come up with a way to introduce the subject, but his ever-present itchiness to see her, coupled with the mind-blowing news that his crush was reciprocated… well, he hadn’t even made it through a decent opener before his feet found their way to her door. She’d smiled when she opened it and saw him, and for the first time he knew that it was more than just friendliness in the curve of her lips and the laughter in her eyes.

He’d grinned like an idiot, that’d been the first mistake. There’s no way she didn’t know something was up when he was smiling like he’d just discovered he could. She’d laughed at him, invited him up to her room. He’d seen an in and wandered over to her stereo, fussed around with the iPod plugged into it. She’d sat on the bed, laughing at him still.

“So, uh… how’s it going?” He’d asked stupidly, scrolling endlessly through her music without seeing it.

“Fine.” She’d smiled so beautifully, so generously at him that he’d lost his plan, the little there was of it. “What’s up? I didn’t expect to see you this afternoon. Aren’t we meeting up at the pub in a couple of hours?”

“Oh… yeah. Yeah. I was just…” He’d panicked as he realized that he didn’t actually have a plausible reason for being there. That’s all he can figure as to why it just came out the way it did. “So. You know what’s a great album? Brotherhood. Top notch, really. You like New Order right? I mean, I know you do.”

He’d known as soon as he’d looked at her, known that one awkward disjointed mumble had completely ruined the whole thing. Her mouth hung open, her eyes lost their glimmer and turned dark and wounded. He’d wanted to bang his head against the wall, but he’d just pressed on instead like the colossal bumbling moron he is.

“Like Bizarre Love Triangle. It’s a classic song. So great.” He could feel the idiotic face he was making, feel his awkwardness seeping out through his eyebrows as he frowned down at her iPod. “Bit mainstream, but can’t really blame it for that. But so good. Means different things to different people, you know.”

“What?” She’d said quietly, tersely, and his whole body had tensed. “What did you just say?”

And he’d frozen. Like a complete arse. He should have just turned around and told her, just said it. But he didn’t. Instead, he’d stared down at the floor, his thumb flicking through the music menu endlessly. When he did finally look up, he’d been horrified to find her near tears, her chest heaving and her eyes blazing.

“You watched them, did you? You watched them and you thought you’d come over here and laugh at me, is that it?” He’d tried to refute her, tried to get his worthless mouth to communicate, to say something, anything at all. But he’d just stared, wide eyed and open mouthed. He couldn’t even manage to shake his head. “I… You… Just go.”

“Rae…” He’d tried, but she’d talked right over him.

“I can’t believe you! I thought you, of all people… I can’t believe you’d watch them! I thought you’d respect me! Respect my privacy!”

“I do!” He’d protested loudly, far too loudly. That had shut her up, and her wounded silence was much worse than her accusations. He’d swallowed, a lot, tried to get his mouth to line up with his brain even just a little, tried to get something out. But he’d just stood there, horrified at her traumatized expression, his mouth stumbling to turn syllables into words. “I… er… you… Rae… I… not… no… see.”

Eventually she’d had enough, and had turned her back on him, presumably to hide the sobs that were shaking her shoulders. He’d stepped forward, hoping that touching her would somehow make it better, but the cord connecting her iPod and stereo wasn’t long enough, and he’d had to step back before he reached her. Reflecting back over the whole horrible thing, this is the moment he most wishes he could change. He should have just set it down and pulled her into a hug, should have put a comforting hand on her shoulder at the very least. But no, he’d just stood tethered at the end of the cord like it was some kind of leash.

“Just go.” She’d muttered, voice gruff and cracking. God, how he’d hated himself for making her sound that way, how he’d tortured himself with the memory of those broken words in the interim between now and that awful day.

It’s like torture still, the incessant replaying of the memory. But he can’t seem to stop it once something triggers it; he’s got to ride it out until those defeated words resound in his mind. They seem to echo endlessly, like his brain is nothing but a series of hollow caverns razed by the sound of her sorrow. Not talking to her is unbearable enough, let alone with that terrible last memory of her voice as his companion in the silence.

But, no. She’d sent him the link; that means she wants him to watch. He can watch that one at least. Just the one, to hear her normal and happy once more. Just the one, to find out if there’s any hope.

So, he clambers out of his bed, half stumbling before he plops down in his computer chair.

He takes a moment to adjust the settings of his laptop, make sure the screen is clear of spots and the volume is all the way up. He closes all the other programs, he doesn’t want to be interrupted. Then he gets up and closes his bedroom door too, just in case. In case of what, he doesn’t really know. His Dad’s not even home, but this feels like something to do in private. Like if he shuts the door and adjusts the settings, somehow the message will be just for him, not for her viewers, but just a private video to Finn on her public YouTube channel. Ugh. Yeah right.

He sent her a private video. He hadn’t really realized until now, but he’d been hoping for one in return. But still, after four and a half days without her, he’ll take what he can get.

He takes a deep breath, checks to make sure the gray bar is fully loaded, and clicks play.

There’s an ad, of course, and he mutters curses to himself as a pair of overly happy parents smile at their blue-eyed baby. He hovers his mouse over the bottom right corner, clicks on the skip ad button as soon as it’s available, and quickly maximizes the screen.

He wants to sit back, but he hunches over instead, hand automatically going to his mouth so he can gnaw at his cuticles. And there she is, all glossy hair and grinning lips, and a weird feeling overtakes him. It’s like he’s being squeezed tightly until all the blood in his body is filling up his head like a balloon, and he thinks he might burst from the pressure of it. But then video Rae speaks, and his head swims with the release of hearing her once again.

“Hiya!” She says brightly, and he can’t help but notice that she looks a little bit tenser, more nervous than she had in her last video. She’s wearing that t-shirt he likes, the red one. “So… I know you guys have been worried about me, since I took down the videos for a bit. Thank you all for your kind, supportive messages. I’m alright, I swear. I just had a bit of a freak out. I am sort of prone to them, you know. I…” She sighs, shaking her head.

“So, someone in my real life found out about these videos. Which, I guess was kind of… inevitable? But, I dunno. It just kind of caught me off guard, and…” Rae looks down for a moment, shrugs, and when she raises her head again, she shoots a rueful, self-deprecating kind of smile at the camera. Finn swallows the spit that has suddenly filled his mouth. “I really over-reacted. Majorly over-reacted. And I’m really sorry.”

She looks straight into the camera for a second, eyes shining with something he can’t quite name. Impossibly, he knows that she’s looking at him. Through the magic of sound waves and transmutation and the incomprehensible mystery of the internet, things Archie could explain much better than Finn, she’s somehow in his bedroom, staring right into his eyes and apologizing. His heart beats faster, though he can feel his muscles loosen; his body always reacts so contrarily around Rae. Apparently video Rae is no exception.

“The thing is, I’ve been pretty… open about my life, my struggles on here. And I’m not sure why I thought it would forever stay this hidden, secret thing.” She chuckles once, and God he wants to be able to touch her in reassurance. It’s like the fight, he’s uselessly tethered by the technology. “And to be honest, it’s not even my… stuff… that I’m embarrassed about. You know, I am who I am, and what I’ve been through makes me who I am today. And Kester…” She rolls her eyes, looks to the side. “Ugh, I can’t believe I’m saying this. Kester was right. Doing these videos has made me stronger, made me better able to see the good in me.”

There’s something in her expression- a softness, a vulnerability tempered with strength that he’s never seen on her before. He’s always admired her strength, how fearless she is in proffering her opinions, her unrelenting assurance that she’s absolutely right. And, he’s of course noticed that scared look she gets sometimes- the fear that she wears like a second skin, equally as covered up as her actual skin, only noticeable in fleeting glances. But this combination of the two, it’s new… and breath-taking. She’s irresistible with that vein of steel showing through her tenderness. He’s wishing he could touch her for a different reason.

“So, it’s not that. As scary as it is, I’m okay with everyone knowing that stuff.” She pauses to swallow, tucks her hair behind her ear. He’s got no idea what she’s talking about, he only ever saw the one video and he doesn’t even know who this Kester bloke is, much to his chagrin. He moves from biting his thumb to gnawing at his forefinger. His hands are going to be a mess by the time the video is over. They’re already in rough shape from the four and a half days of silence. “But I am really embarrassed to have laid it all out there with that stuff about my mates. Mostly Archie, that’s good and humiliating when you watch it all back. But he’s a nice bloke, and he and I have talked about it, so…”

She puffs out her cheeks, rolls her eyes before shooting the camera a smile. Finn is suddenly, explosively pissed off. He pauses the video and stalks to the window for a smoke. She’s been talking to Archie? He doesn’t know if Archie has watched the videos, but it seems cruelly unfair that Rae and Archie have been having little fucking heart to hearts over whatever the hell it is they contain, while Finn’s been sitting here stewing for the last four and a half days. He can imagine the ease of their conversations, how quick Archie’d be to say just the right thing, and how little Rae would stare with injured eyes. They’d laugh and hug and maybe even snog a little. After all, they’ve done it before.

Worst of all, Archie completely failed to mention their little chats. Even when Finn had called him, moping about how he missed Rae and had to do something to get her back, the bastard hadn’t said a single word. Maybe Rae and Archie were dating again, maybe that’s what’s so embarrassing in her videos, her talking about wanting to get back together with him. They have almost nothing in common, really. Except for how smart they both are, how much they both like to bloody read. But Finn would be a much better boyfriend for her than Archie would. He’d never stand her up like fucking Archer did.

Maybe he’d misunderstood what she’d said in the video. Maybe he’d overestimated her feelings for him.

And he’d sent her that bloody video like a complete twat.

He’d thought it was a good idea, a good way to show her how he felt in a language she’d understand. He knows how music can touch you on a level words can never reach. So, if there was ever a way to tell Rae Earl he wanted her, clearly it’s with a song.

God, he’d been nervous. Maybe more nervous than he’s ever been. His Dad had taught him and Archie to play guitar when they were eleven or twelve, and outside of the two of them and Nan, no one else had ever heard him play. Archie’d taken to it with ease, of course, bloody good at everything, he is. But Finn… though he was technically okay, Nan had always said he played with his hands instead of his heart. He could play the songs, he just couldn’t make them feel like anything.

In retrospect, it probably wasn’t that great of a plan. Probably didn’t seem like much to her, if she’s busy snogging Archie all over the place. He’d probably only played with his hands again, unable to get across what he wanted to say with his heart.

But he’d set up his Dad’s video camera, pulled his guitar on his lap and tried to tell her as best he could, despite his nervous tapping and lip-licking. He’s sure there was too much silence in the beginning, too long of him shifting uncomfortably and needlessly retuning his guitar and fiddling with his hair. But he’d left it exactly how he’d shot it, he couldn’t stand even the idea of watching himself back to edit it. He’d dragged one of the kitchen stools up to his room to perch on, and then he’d had to adjust the angle of the camera a thousand times to get it right. She probably didn’t even make it to the part where he’d done something.

Eventually, he’d run out of things to adjust and sat staring blankly at the camera, trying to hide his shaking fingers underneath his thighs. He’d done the stupid gaping thing again, even though he’d worked through what he wanted to say this time. He’d even practiced in the mirror a bit. But talking to the camera wasn’t like talking to his own reflection, and he’d tripped over his words for a while until he’d forced himself to envision her sitting there on top of his bureau instead of the camera. It’d been an absurd image, and even fake Rae in his imagination had been scowling at being perched so high. But it had made him smile, loosened his unruly tongue and he’d found his voice.

“Hey Rae.” He’d mumbled, pulling a hand from under his thigh to wave and stuffing it back immediately with a grimace. “So, I’m really sorry about the other day. I…” He’d swallowed, uncomfortable in front of the camera, uncomfortable in his own skin during the Rae-free days. “Well, you’ve probably noticed that I’m not very good with words. I tried to tell you… but, I dunno, I just couldn’t get it out. I can never get it out right, especially around you.”

He’d looked at his lap, pulled a hand out to rub at his shoulder. Even in his planned speeches, he can never just say it, never just flat out tell her he wants her. So he’d twisted his lips up, bitten at his bottom one, twitched his foot where it hung over the rung of the stool. The guitar had bounced a bit on his knee. Finally, he’d looked up again, forced himself to envision it was her, forced himself to smile.

“So, I thought maybe I’d follow your lead and use a song to… uh, tell you what I’m thinking.” The grin had come easy then, remembering her lovely voice filtered through his speakers. But then he’d gotten nervous again, his voice wasn’t like hers. And this wasn’t New Order. “So, umm, I didn’t write this. It’s this American band, and it’s kind of old, like from 2000. Archie introduced me to them; you know how he’s always on a grand search for acoustic stuff to play. But I like them. This guy, this song just said exactly what I couldn’t say, you know?”

He’d swallowed again, rubbed at the back of his neck. He could feel himself blushing, feel his ears hot against his head. He’d been vaguely irritated at how silly he must look, all embarrassed and shy. But he had to have Rae back, he’d reasoned. Whatever it took.

“So yeah.” He’d stared into the lens for a long minute, and the silence seemed to beat at him. He could swear he heard the clock ticking in the garden shed. He’d forced his trembling fingers onto the strings, and took a deep breath. “Here goes.

I’m starting to fashion an idea in my head,

Where I would impress you with every single word I said,

Would come out insightful or brave or smooth or charming.

And you’d wanna call me.

And I… would be there every time you need me.

I’d be there every time.”

The first verse had come out a little shaky, and he’d winced at his own delivery. He didn’t have anything close to Rae’s talent, to her smooth clear voice. But as he’d sang, he’d allowed himself to remember her the way she’d been at the park the week before- the way she’d tilted her face up to the sun, her hair shimmering golden and warm in the light, and her lips curving into a small, private smile. He’d stared unabashedly at her that day as she relished in the afternoon sun, not caring if he was caught. He’d boldly dreamed of kissing those sun drenched lips, of smoothing his fingers over her warm cheeks.

And somehow, in his reverie, his body had taken over the rest of the song. His fingers worked through the familiar chords, his burning ears ceased their flaming. He’d lost his self consciousness in thoughts of her, gained back his assurance in his feelings for her. His voice was stronger as he hit the chorus.

“But for now, I’ll look so longingly,

Waiting

For you to want me, for you to need me

For you to notice me.”

The song had poured from him, his constant second-guessing and self-doubt lost as the music pushed all thoughts from his head. He’d been startled when his fingers picked out the final notes and the tune faded from his guitar. He’d slowly pulled the strap over his head and bent down to put the guitar back in its stand, needing some time to compose himself before he had to talk again. He’d thought that finally he’d been able to get his parts to line up together and work in unison. For Rae. He hadn’t felt nervous, just languid and dreamy, struggling to pull his thoughts from the haze of the song.

“So, that was Dashboard Confessional. Kind of appropriate, as this is sort of my confessional.” He’d raised his eyes from his lap back to the camera, emboldened to finally tell her how he felt with the music still stirring his blood. “When I watched that video, Rae, and you said that you… liked me…” He’d shaken his head, unable to hold back his wondering grin. “All I wanted was to tell you how much I fancied you. How long, how many times I’ve wanted to kiss you. And I just… I messed it up. You’ve no idea how much I wish my words would come out insightful or brave or smooth or charming. Or just come out at all, really.”

He’d chuckled self-consciously, awkwardness creeping back in slowly. “I, uh… Like I said, I’m really sorry. I shouldn’t have… But, I was kinda hoping you might forgive me? Maybe, uh… give me a chance? Or, uh… us… a chance. What do you think?” He’d looked pleadingly, pathetically at the camera for a minute. “Well, you know where I’ll be.”

He’d nearly tripped over his own feet still tucked into the pegs of the stool when he’d tried to stand up, awkwardly lurching towards the camera. He’d fumbled with the buttons on the side, picking it up, but ducked back into the frame briefly before turning it off.

“Say yes, Rae, ok?”

His ears burn with humiliation again as he remembers his eagerness, the stupid smile he’d shot at the screen before turning it off. It was bad enough to do it thinking that she might actually say yes. How can he stomach having sent that to her if she’s secretly going out with Archie again? He envisions the two of them, faces glowing blue in the light of her computer screen, laughing and ahhing at little video Finn singing a song Archie’d introduced him to as a way to win Rae’s affections. He’s sick just thinking of it.

He stubs out his cigarette, slams the window shut, and returns to his computer. It’s probably all gushing about Archie, probably all secret smiles and pink cheeks about how fit he is. But he’s got to know, at the very least. He’s got to be certain there’s no chance. Finn straightens his shoulders before pressing play once more.

Video Rae takes a deep breath, lets it out slowly as she lowers her shoulders. “So, that just leaves one person. The person who I’ve talked about maybe more than the rest of them combined. And not always favorably.”

She grimaces and licks her lips. Finn’s foot begins tapping frantically beneath the desk. Is she talking about him? Dammit, if he’d actually watched the stupid videos like she thinks he did, maybe he’d understand what she’s fucking talking about.

“So, to him…” She looks right into the camera again, and his breath catches. She’s got to be talking about him, right? “I’m really sorry about calling you a prick. A lot. And about saying you didn’t know anything about music. You do know some things, just not as much as me.”

She gives him a cheeky little grin, and he lets out the breath he’d been holding. She glances down for a second, then looks up at him through her eyelashes. “But the rest… I meant all that. “ Her mouth twitches, like she’s fighting a smile. Finn moves on to gnawing his middle finger. Rae mirrors his gesture, lifting her hand to her mouth to bite at her thumbnail. Then she grins, wide and brilliant and straight at him.

“So, for today’s song, I’m going with something a little bit different. Someone introduced me to this band in a pretty spectacular way,” Rae twists her mouth around for a moment, bites her lip, then laughs. “A pretty… sexy way, and, um I’m hooked. I um, I…”

She looks up at the ceiling, a soft dreamy kind of smile overtaking her face, before shaking herself and returning her grinning gaze to him. She chuckles lightly. “I’ll just play it then, shall I? Yes. Play it.”

Rae reaches beneath her and pulls up her guitar, settles it onto her lap and puts her fingers into place. She glances back up at him, cocks her head, and then starts playing. He watches her fingers first as they slide along the fret, then shifts his gaze to her eyelashes lying downy soft against her skin, then rests on the arch of her bottom lip as she licks it in preparation to sing.

“So she says,

Everyone’s going to the party.

Won’t you come if I come with a friend for your friend?

I’d be so pleased to see you out of the classroom,

Wearing a smile that I’ll bring you.

I was hoping to learn a few things,

Like…”

Finn laughs, or makes a sound that he thinks would be a laugh if he had any air in his lungs. She’s everywhere, everything with her voice surrounding him, singing that song. He gets it. For fucks sake, he finally gets it. Despite himself, he squeezes his eyes shut and scrunches his face tightly, and gives in to the laughter that’s bubbling within him.

He scrubs his hand over his face, covers his eyes and just grins madly for a minute, Rae’s gorgeous voice drifting through him in perfect accompaniment to his joy. He chuckles as his hand passes over his forehead to tangle in his fringe and ruffle his hair. He runs his tongue over his back teeth, props his head on his elbow and opens his eyes to stare at Rae’s smiling face as she sings. He gets it.

She’s singing Dashboard, too. The second song in the EP, the second part of the romance the short album paints. He sang about waiting for her, she’s singing about asking him out. She’s fucking singing about asking him on a date.

He finds himself standing suddenly, a huge grin overtaking his face, overtaking his self. He’s nothing more than effervescence, nothing more than an enormous smile and a Dashboard song. He spins in a circle, glancing pointlessly around his room as if it’s suddenly different. It’s not, of course it’s not, but it feels different. It’s not the room of moping anymore, the room of carefully selected sad bastard songs the way it’s been for the last four and a half days. Now it’s a room where Rae is singing back the familiar song for him, filming a video just for him, singing him a bloody love song.

Oh, fuck, she’s still singing and he’s missing it, standing in the middle of the room smiling at nothing. God, he’s glad he closed the door. Imagine someone seeing him like this.

He nearly leaps back to his seat, scrubs the video backwards a bit to revisit her inscrutable words with the new clarity of knowing it’s him. He’s intrigued that she’d talked negatively about him, but not really put off. He had been a prick, so it doesn’t bother him that she called him that. He kind of likes it, actually, likes that Rae is the type of girl to call it like it is. She never puts up with his bullshit. He wishes he could watch the videos, wishes he could see her spit vitriol, wishes he could witness the evolution of her opinion of him, but he knows better. He’s gotten this far, he’s not going to do something stupid and fuck it all up now.

When she calls him sexy, he almost gives it all up and leaves for her house again without even bothering to watch the rest of the video. It takes nearly all of his self control to stay in his chair, and he forces himself to remember the four and a half empty days. Whatever she’s got to say in the video, she had to work up to it a bit. He owes it to her to watch it all.

Plus, what if she talks about him more? He’s not going into the next conversation with her blind.

He touches his lips as video Rae starts to sing again, runs a finger along the curve of his smile. He wishes the volume went louder, considers briefly how difficult it would be to hook his laptop up to his stereo speakers. He wants to surround himself in her voice, let it wrap around him, let it feel its way into all the nooks and crannies of his room. But it’d take too long, he thinks, and he doesn’t want to miss even a fraction of a second.

“I was hoping to learn a few things,

Like…

 

Do you, do you like dishing the dirt on the whole class?

Or talking the big smack, or playing the fool?

Wearing all of the latest fashions,

Or bucking the new trends and wearing your old threads?

Or if you like coffee in the evening,

These are a few things that I’d like to know.

I’d like to know.”

Rae’s grinning around the words, her face lit up with humor as she sings. He suddenly remembers that picture from her Facebook- she’s wearing the same kind of carefree happiness that he’d been fascinated with in the photo. She looks like sadness has never touched her. He wants nothing so much in the world as to touch her right now.

She licks her lips when she pauses, and though he knows it’s ridiculous, it still feels like an invitation for a kiss. But then, maybe he just wants to kiss her so bad that everything feels like an invitation for a kiss.

Shit, he’s probably gonna get to kiss her. Soon.

“So I say,

I’ve been scheduled to work, but I’ll call in,

And my friend isn’t busy, he’d be happy to join me.

And maybe my friend and your friend will hit it off.

Or maybe, we will.

 

I’m dying to know,

Do you, do you like dreaming of things so impossible?

Or only the practical, or ever the wild?

Or waiting through all your bad, bad days

Just to end them with someone you care about?

 

Or do you like making out, long drives, and brown eyes,

And guys that just don’t quite fit in?

Yes, do you like them?”

Rae laughs a little as she sings about making out, and Finn’s ears get hot. His fingers tingle, and he rubs them absently against the rough threads of his jeans. Rae’s eyes meet his through the camera as she sings about brown eyes and misfits. She raises her eyebrows at him, nods as the words spill from her mouth. He sighs softly, smiling at her like she can see him. Rae’s voice is soft and breathy as she finishes the song, eyes twinkling as they travel the distance between them to find his.

“So, yes, I’ll see you there.”

The notes weave through the air as she strums her guitar for the last bit of the song, and Finn draws his eyebrows together at the silence that descends as Rae looks up from her guitar. She stares into the camera blankly for a long moment, and Finn wonders if she feels lost in the magic she’d created with her voice the way he does. She’s enchanted him again, sorcery in D flat.

After a second, Rae smiles slyly. “That was Dashboard Confessional, ‘So Impossible.’ There’s a link below, of course, to the original. There’s a lot of covers out there;” she laughs and rolls her eyes, “when I was searching for the tab, a lot of the links said that Dashboard songs are a great way to get girls. So, I’m hoping you’re all swooning. I know it worked for me, so…”

Finn bounces in his seat. It worked, his embarrassing gambit of sending her the video actually worked. Thank God for those guitar lessons. He was buying his Dad a new tie.

“I’ve been thinking a lot lately about saying yes.” Rae’s smile has faded, and a tightness appears in her eyes and the corners of her lips. Finn’s heart begins to pound again, his body recognizing that this is it. This is the decision she’s made about him. “I’m not really a person who has ever had many yeses. My life has always been an awful lot of nos. Both from other people and from myself.”

Rae raises her eyebrows and licks her lips, and Finn finds himself unconsciously mirroring her movements. His chest feels tight, like his body is clamping down in preparation for bad news.

“Yeses can be scary, though. They’re full of potential, for good and for bad.” Rae takes a deep breath. Finn feels like she must be using all the available air, because he’s got none. “But I don’t want to be a person of nos. Kester says we can choose who we want to be, and I want to be a person who says yes, a person who accepts yes, a person who can ask in hope of a yes. Did any of that make sense?”

Not really. He’s confused, in all that mess of yeses and nos, he’s not sure where his question even fits in. But something is dawning over her face, like the sunlight that made her glow in the park. He manages a deep breath as he watches her smile grow.

“Here’s what I am trying to say-” she begins, and he chuckles with relief that he doesn’t have to figure it out from her convoluted speech. “If a person wanted to maybe work their way through the rest of the EP with me, try for a Hands Down kind of thing, they might be able to find me at the park this afternoon, say until dark? And, they might find me willing to try out my new resolution for yeses.”

Her hands rise up as she speaks, waving around to punctuate her words before resting back on top of her guitar. He watches them move as his brain works through what she’s saying. She wants to play the rest of the EP with him? It’s not exactly the first date he was hoping for, but it sounds pretty freaking good anyway. Or maybe it’s not a date, maybe she just wants to sing with him?

Video Rae laughs, drawing his attention back to the screen. She’s wrinkling her nose in that painfully adorable way, and he groans. He just wants to press his nose against her smushy nose, why does it have to be so hard? “Ugh, I’m afraid that was even more muddled than before. Hopefully it’ll make sense when it counts? Thanks for watching Earl Grey everybody. See you next week!”

Finn huffs a huge sigh as video Rae waves goodbye, still making a face at the camera. It feels like good news, but he’s not sure. It’d felt like good news last time too, and look how that had turned out. He scrubs back and listens to her little speech again, puzzling through. Yeses, she wants to be a person of yeses. If he goes to the park, he’ll find her waiting to practice her yeses. She wants to say yes.

Oh shit, she wants to say yes.

He grins broadly as understanding dawns over him. She wants to say yes to him, to them. She wants to go on a first date. She wants it to be a ‘Hands Down’ awesome date. The best kiss she can ever remember.

He slams his fists down on the desk in excitement, crows a gruff whoop into the empty room. He’s gonna fucking kiss her. Yes. She’s waiting, all he’s got to do is get to her. He’s not going to bother with unruly words this time, he’s just going to go to the park and kiss her. Can’t screw that up.

Finn glances towards the window in alarm, noting the low slant of the sunlight streaming through the window. She said until dark, and it’s getting late. Fuck, he’d better go. He has to show up. All this, he’s not going to stand her up. She’s waiting for him, waiting to say yes.

He rises quickly, grateful that he’d failed to take off his boots earlier. That’ll save him some time. He’s across the room, down the stairs and grabbing his jacket and keys before the chair stops spinning. He’s nearly out the door when he catches a glimpse of himself in the hall mirror and darts back into the bathroom to fix his hair. God, if he showed up with it sticking up like that, she’s probably change her mind. He stares at his reflection for a second, trying to see his features through her eyes, then grabs the mouthwash and takes a swig, swishing it around for a bit and spitting it out. He adjusts his fringe one more time, shrugs at himself, and then he’s out the door.

He takes the scooter again, even though it hadn’t worked out so well last time. But he’s impatient, and it’d take too long to walk. Besides, there’s no speeches to plan this time, nothing for him to screw up. Kissing doesn’t take planning. And even if it did, he’s spent enough time fantasizing about her that he’s set.

Her song’s replayed three times in his head by the time he pulls onto the right street. He parks his bike, jumps off and strides quickly towards their usual spot. It takes three strange looks before he realizes that he’s still wearing his helmet. He takes it off and stands still for a moment, tries to give his heartbeat a chance to slow, tries to give himself time to calm down. His eyes strain for a glimpse of dark hair the whole time.

His pace is slower and more measured as he approaches their spot, but his heart is thrumming like he’s in the middle of a run. He can’t really do much about it.

Rae’s not there.

He squints towards the sun, low on the horizon, but still up. He’d made it before dark, where was she? A sludge of emotions wash over him- disappointment and regret and anxiety and despair and fear and sorrow and irritation. He’d watched it as soon as he got it, he can’t reverse time, Rae. What does she expect? He got here as fast as he could.

He spins in a circle, runs a hand through his hair. He closes his eyes and fights the urge to throw his helmet and kick whatever he can find nearby.

“Finn.” Her voice is soft and he has a long moment where he can’t discern if it’s real. He opens his eyes and spins towards the sound.

And there she is, backlit by the setting sun, a halo of light warming her features. A careless breeze blows strands of her hair around her face, golden filigree adorning her. Her eyes are warm, and she’s got that strange but beautiful blend of strength and softness about her- wary of what might happen, but willing to face it, nonetheless. She’s radiant. She’s everything he’s hoped for, everything he’s wanted.

He drops his helmet. He doesn’t feel his body crossing the distance between them, doesn’t see anything but her anxious face. As soon as he’s close enough, his hands grasp her, fill with her summer skin. He touches her cheek, traces the line of shadow where the sun doesn’t reach.

And then his lips are on hers and nothing else matters for the space of the kiss.

She laughs when they break apart, reaches up to touch her lips. “Bloody hell, Finn, you could’ve asked.”

“I thought you were all yeses now?” She wrinkles her nose and he laughs, then reaches up to smooth down the ridges that have formed across the bridge of her nose. He thinks that maybe nothing has ever felt more satisfying. “So, Rae. Will you go out with me? On a proper date?”

Rae purses her lips and furrows her forehead. “Will you bring your guitar? It’s only yes if you bring your guitar.”

A burst of laughter escapes him in surprise. God, she’s wonderful. “Deal. You can have anything you want. I’ll be all yeses too.”

“Anything?” She asks, a glimmer of mischief sparkling in her eyes. Rae places a hand on his shoulder and pulls him closer, until their bodies are pressed together pleasantly. He has a moment where he’s sure he’s in trouble, where he’s sure that whatever she wants is going to cost him. But then her lips are on his again and it’s lost in the heat that spreads thin underneath his skin. He wraps his arms around her waist and gives in. Whatever she wants, she can have, as long as he gets to kiss her.


End file.
